NRC SILENT ON SAN ONOFRE HEARINGS ISSUE

Chairman asks for patience as panel weighs calls for public meeting over plant restart

The chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is asking for patience amid calls for public hearings on plans to restart the San Onofre nuclear reactor.

Allison Macfarlane, the top U.S. nuclear safety regulator, issued a written statement Monday that says she and four fellow nuclear commissioners are restricted in their ability to comment about the possibility of public hearings related to the restart of the plant until at least June 7.

That is the deadline for appealing a decision calling for the opportunity for court-like hearings on the restart.

“The NRC understands that there is significant public interest in the opportunity for a hearing, and we will provide more information about the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board decision after further review of that decision and after the appeal period has elapsed,” Macfarlane said.

Federal regulators have indefinitely delayed a decision on the proposed restart of the shuttered San Onofre nuclear power plant. Deadlines for a final decision were removed at least a week ago from the nuclear commission’s webpage on the San Onofre outage, now in its 16th month.

The Atomic Licensing and Safety Board found that the destructive vibrations among steam generator tubes that have sidelined San Onofre are not accounted for in the plant’s official safety blueprint, known as the updated Final Safety Analysis Report.

An evaluation by nuclear commission staff of plans to restart the plant at partial power amounts to an amendment of the operating rules — creating the opportunity for public hearings, the board found.

Plant operator Southern California Edison or nuclear commission staff can file an appeal that might bring the matter before Macfarlane and her colleagues. Neither party has said whether they will.

The dual-reactor plant in northern San Diego County, once capable of powering 1.4 million homes at time, has been sidelined since Jan. 31, 2012, after a small radiation leak helped uncover rapid wear on steam generator tubes carrying radioactive water.

San Onofre is owned by SCE, San Diego Gas & Electric and the city of Riverside.